Assassin

     This week saw the start of Senior Assassin at Reading Memorial High School. I was very happy when I heard we would be playing it this year. I have heard countless exciting stories from my older cousins who had played it in their towns in the past. Basically how it works is everyone playing is assigned a target that they must "assassinate" with water. Any assassinated player is out, and their target is assigned to the person that shot them. Eventually our pool of 191 players will be whittled down to two. In the end, there should be one winner. So after four days of intense competition, here are some observations.

     First, I have realized this week that being a stalker in the 21st century is unsettlingly easy. All it took was a few Google searches and I had my target's address. Now stick the address in street view and you have a pretty solid idea of what the target's house and neighborhood looks like. You can even pick out the bushes that might be good to hide in. As you're reading this, you're probably having the same feelings I was having while I was doing it: this is not ok. Don't worry, I know. But this is really the only time in our my life where being a stalker won't be incredibly illegal, so I might as well embrace it!

     The other funny thing I've noticed is the increased level of paranoia around the game. While some people claim to have made "alliances", we all know it's every man for himself. Everybody is incredibly suspicious and very hesitant to trust anything anybody says. I feel like this game has a strange way of bringing the class together as a whole, while at the same time, destroying friend groups. The past few mornings I have run from my house to my car with water gun in hand. Every time I hear a noise outside I immediately stop whatever I am doing and check it out. It's certainly deafcon 1 around my house and it will be interesting to see how the game progresses.